I have arrived safe and well in Spain and am almost at the end of my first week in this beautiful country! I am currently in my hostel in Cordoba and am feeling quite excited as tomorrow is my birthday. Twenty-two is my favourite number so I have a feeling that this year will be excellent.
I’ll give you a run down of what happened yesterday which was quite eventful!
Tuesday, 13th December
Today we had a delicious breakfast (the first I have actually enjoyed) and walked to the Alcazar, a 10th century fortress built by Abd Al Rahman III. It was turned into a palace by the Spanish and actually destroyed twice, once from a fire and again during the Spanish Civil War. It was rebuilt in it’s image and became a military academy and now is a military museum. It was just amazing to see a structure (the bits that remain) from the 10th century! Plus, the museum house so many interesting objects. We saw a document that was written by Cervantes that had his signature and everything – AMAZING! The Alcazar had SO MUCH in there but we didn’t have time to see everything. Plus, there is only so many rifles and cannons one can actually look at in a day!
We then tried to find the Monasterio de Santo Domingo El Antiguo. We could not find it for AGES and kept asking locals who gave us completely different directions. Some of them had never even heard of it! I was giving up hope that we’d even find it when we finally came across the building. We went inside but it was all closed up and we saw that it closed at 12pm, even though the Lonely Planet Guide said 1:30pm. It didn’t open again until 4pm so we were really disappointed!
We then went to the Monasterio de San Juan de Los Reyes, which was built by the Catholic monarchs, Ferdinand and Isabella. It had the most beautiful garden and a pretty little church that we explored. Just down the street we went to Sinagoga Santa Maria la Blanca which was a beautiful synagogue with Moorish architecture. It has these incredibly high white arches and lovely artworks all around the walls. I took a few photos and bought some gorgeous postcards to send to everyone back home.
Further down the road we went to the Sinagoga de Transito, which was another beautiful synagogue with a Sephardic Museum. This was really close to our hostel so we came back and booked our accommodation for Cordoba, Granada and Seville. I am SUPER excited for Seville because our hostel looks amazing and it will be so nice to spend Christmas in a lovely environment. That way I hopefully wont miss everyone at home too much! Looking unlikely but at least it will be a new experience. A cold Christmas will be new to me so I am hoping it will be fun.
After a little rest we decided to walk down to the water and try to find the cable ferry that crosses the river Tajo. This was not the most successful trip and although we sort of worked out where it would leave from, we were running out of time to see everything and it didn’t really seem worth it. We then almost ran back up into the city which was super tiring as the hills were really steep! We went into the café where we had breakfast but they said the kitchen was closed despite the fact they were over for another hour and a half. By this stage it was 4:30pm and we hadn’t had anything to eat since about 10am so we were HUNGRY! We found out that pretty much EVERYTHING closes at 6pm so we quickly went to the Iglesia de Santo Tome which houses the magnificent El Greco painting, ‘The Burial of the Count of Orgaz’. The Count’s body was enclosed in a crypt underneath the painting. When we walked in a saw it we were in absolute awe and just stared at it for a good 10 minutes. After studying the painting at uni, it was so fantastic so see it in the flesh. The colours and lighting were just spectacular and it was probably the highlight of my day.
Afterwards we were determined to get to the Monasterio de Santo Domingo El Antiguo that had been shut earlier. This time, we did not get so ridiculously lost and got there with an hour to look around. When we arrived it looked really closed up so we rang the bell and eventually a woman spoke to us from behind a door. She asked who we were which really confused us and we tried to ask (in broken Spanish) if we could come in. She said no and we totally did not understand so I asked why. She said that no one ever came in and I was worried that they had closed the museum. Britt said “Es possible visitar El Greco? En la crypta?” And the woman was super confused and kept saying no. We had no idea what was going on so I asked her whether this was the Monasterio de Santo Domingo El Antiguo to which she said NO! Turns out it was an enclosed convent and not the Monastery at all! This was the second time we had tried to get in there today, we must have really freaked them out! We were laughing so much when we realised what was happening and then we were so confused because we realised we had NO IDEA where this Monastery was! We asked a lovely man in the street who gave us directions and we finally found it a street or two away! The Monastery houses several El Greco paintings and the crypt and coffin of El Greco himself. Turns out we had to crouch down on the floor as there was a tiny glass window to look through and see the coffin.
We went to dinner afterwards and it was probably one of the most hilarious meals I have ever had. We laughed so much that my sides started to hurt. It was such a hilarious, incredible day and I do believe that we pretty much walked up EVERY street in the city!
Will write more soon!
Adios, Clare xx
Simply amazing : )
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